Controller recommendations

I have an Irritrol Total Control that came with the house. It is not sending 24VAC to the terminals, but power is coming from the transformer. There are no error messages to speak of.

I have six stations in my sprinkler system and am looking for recommendations for a controller that won't bankrupt me. Any installation tips are welcome as well. Bonus points if I can buy it at a big box hardware store or my local plumbing supply store.

Craniac,
I am an engineer homeowner that just designed his own 30 station system to irrigate 2.5 acres of lawn. Your Irritrol is top quality, but industry favorite is the Hunter. AT six stations you have multiple choices from Orbit, Toro, Rainbird, and a host of others, but the standard is Hunter. I just got my dad a Hunter SRS to replace a Rainbird and stayed under $75. Stay away from the Home stores. Look in the big yellow book for irrigation and find a Ewing spot, they are in just abot evry state west of the Mississippi or south of the mason-dixon. Otherwise check on-line at Sprinklerwarehouse or Evergreen.
Easyfix for cheap, but get the good stuff.

I'll put a plug in for Hunter as well, but personally I wouldn't consider anything less than a Pro-C.

I'll also put a plug in for the WeatherMatic Smartline. A good entry level ET controller that is ideally suited for residential applications at a competitive price point (Fimco would be proud of me Boots)

Without sounding like a schill, I too will recommend the Weathermatic Smartline over the rest. Being an installer, I prefer the ease of programming over the Hunter. I have a lot of older clients, and the 1 button run manual program is an invaluable feature. I also like the seasonal adjustment by month. This allows me to turn on a system in the spring, and set up a standard program, then adjust the percentages of times run by month. I normally run 45% in April, 65% in May, 90% in June, 100% in July, 120% in August and then 65% again in September. You would insert your weather percentages as needed.

There are 2 different base units for the Smartline series, the SL1600 which is in a large outdoor rated cabinet, up to 16 zones, and the SL800 which is a smaller thin clock with an external transformer. It is capable of operating 8 zones.

Both are almost identical in features, including a built in valve buzzer (locator) and fault testing.

Just out of Curiosity, have you ever taught 80+ year old people to program or even operate a sprinkler clock?

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Plenty of 60 and 70 year olds, maybe a few 80 year olds, but then that is why they hire me, to schedule the controller.

IMHO, the majority of homeowners have no business in the controller because they just don't understand plant water needs or how to schedule to meet those needs. Typically the most I will ask a homeowner to do is turn the controller on or off, or make changes to the season adjust (non-ET controllers). These are very simple operations for the majority of the controllers on the market that any 6 year old could figure it out.